


it’s just like being alone

by ever_neutral



Category: Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-04
Updated: 2011-12-04
Packaged: 2017-10-26 22:37:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/288654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ever_neutral/pseuds/ever_neutral
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She swishes the amber liquid around in the cut glass. “I suppose you’d like me to fellate for you now.”</p><p>[set after <i>Homecoming</i>]</p>
            </blockquote>





	it’s just like being alone

  
“You know what? We should fuck.”

There’s no show about it, no simpering or waggling eyebrows. The suggestion is almost bored.

She appraises him from the table. “What makes you think I’d have any interest in that?”

Damon shrugs, a loose up-and-down motion. “You’re here. I’m here.”

“Mmm. Is your reasoning always this elegant?”

His eyes do something that can only be described as twinkling. “Well, if you want, I can woo you.”

Rebekah pours another glass of his bourbon. “I remember your wooing efforts.” Strolls over to sit beside him on the couch with the bottle. “They ended with my skewer through your gut.”

He pouts a little. Looks a bit like a demented child. “You’re a little bit mean, aren’t you.” He takes the bottle out of her hand.

“You’re a first-class jerk, from what I hear.”

He tilts his bottle in her direction. “Hey, don’t forget who un-daggered you.”

“I’m so grateful.” She swishes the amber liquid around in the cut glass. “I suppose you’d like me to fellate for you now.”

A twitch of his mouth. “Can’t say I’d turn the offer down.”

“Of course not.” She examines her nails. “But won’t Elena be jealous?”

He blinks. Frowns.

She smirks. His blankness is just shy of adorable. “Oh, but wait.” She leans toward him. “Perhaps that’s the idea.”

“That’s not the idea,” he says irritably.

“No?” She rolls her eyes, slumps back against the cushions. “How dreadfully dull.”

He shakes his head. “Whatever.” Rises up off the couch. “I’m going out.”

She tilts her head up at him. “Half a point for a half-hearted effort.”

He hovers, appearing undecided as to what to say. Finally he says nothing and leaves her to herself.

She sips from her glass, glad to be alone. She’s truly growing tired of Salvatore men and their indecisiveness.

//

It's a dull day. She finds herself wandering to the school. Call it nostalgia. She watches cheerleading practice happening on the field, finds it rather pathetic, now that she's on the sidelines. They're no good without me, of course, Rebekah thinks. (There's no place for me, of course, she thinks.)

"Whatcha doing here?"

She turns. "Damon." Rolls her eyes. "Are you stalking me now?"

"Don't flatter yourself, honey," he says, with no real bite. He's all jet-black hair and leather on a bright green, sunny field. "I'm here for Elena."

"Of course you are," Rebekah says, already bored of the conversation. _Elena, Elena, Elena_ , she thinks. ( _Backstabber_ , she thinks.) Before them, a girl is in the process of climbing on top of another girl's shoulders. "Well, go on then."

He doesn't. "Ah, team spirit.” Shoots an appreciative look at the cluster of cheerleaders on the field. "Nothing like it."

"You would know.” She's not sure what she means by it, hasn't known him for long enough. But it seems as good a response as any.

On the field, the shoulder-climbing girl suddenly topples over, bringing three others down with her.

Damon crosses his arms. "I know why you're here."

Rebekah treats him to her coolest gaze. "Oh?”

“Yep,” he says simply. “You don’t fool me.”

The unwelcome buzz of irritation rises up inside her. “Is there something you especially want? Or is yapping nonsense just what you do for amusement?"

Whatever smarmy thing he’s about to say is interrupted by a yell.

“Damon!”

They both swivel in the direction of Elena, who’s making her way toward them with a look of disgruntled impatience.

Rebekah resists the urge to roll her eyes again. “It’s your charge.” She turns her gaze back to the field, where the cheerleaders are clumsily attempting a pyramid. “Best run along now.”

“Damon, you were supposed to meet me in the parking lot,” Elena grouses, drawing closer. “This isn’t the parking lot.”

“Yeaaaaah,” Damon says noncommittally. “Got distracted.”

Elena makes an annoyed sound in the back of her throat. “Rebekah,” she says, in an altogether different tone. “What are you doing here? Are you okay?”

Rebekah says nothing.

“She’s fine,” Damon says, offhand. “She’s swell. Come on, I’ll take you home.”

Rebekah doesn’t look at either of them. She stands, as rigid as a post, and waits for their bickering to fade into the distance.

On the field, girls who look exactly her age make a perfect pyramid.

//

"I'm taking you out," Damon announces.

Rebekah looks up from the magazine article offering her tips on ‘how to keep your man’. "What?"

"Well, you've been screwing around this place for a week drinking all my liquor. I figured you might wanna do that somewhere more exciting."

A flurry of panic starts up somewhere in her stomach.

He wants to make me be around _people_ , Rebekah thinks. Being back in a coffin for another eighty years would be a more appealing prospect.

She turns back to her magazine, says in a calm voice, "I'm not interested in going anywhere with you."

"Oh, come _on_ ," he says with no real impatience. "Enough with this self-imposed isolation. You're nearly as mopey as my brother."

She looks at him.

He blinks. Looks away. Clears his throat. "Come on, I'll make it worth your while."

She raises an eyebrow. "I'm not going to sleep with you."

He rolls his eyes. "Been there, had that conversation, sweetheart."

"Then what?" she asks, trying not to sound curious.

He tilts his head toward the door, an almost friendly gesture. "I'll show you."

//

He takes her to a cabaret bar.

It's ridiculous, of course. She wants to hate him, but some part of her is almost touched. (The same part that wants to spend her days doing gymnastics with people a thousand years her junior, she supposes.)

"Nothing like what you're used to, I'm sure," Damon says. "But still."

Rebekah says nothing. The place is tacky at best, but bursting and straining with crude life, the kind she used to love to coax away to dark corners and feast from as brass instruments would crescendo.

She supposes this is what nostalgia feels like.

"Come on." Damon guides her through the crowd, a hand resting lightly on her shoulder blade.

She can't think of anything else to do, so she follows his lead.

//

Some hours later, the room is spinning pleasantly to the pulsating of a bass drum. The scent of the human blood surrounding them is intoxicating—but in the best sort of way, the sort where she’s forgotten what everything else feels like.

“Mmm. Why didn’t I do this before?” Rebekah muses as she swirls absinthe around in her glass.

“What? Come out with me?” Damon responds, his eyes doing their trademark clownish dance. In more sober moments she’d find it irritating; tonight, however, it’s endearing.

“Hmm.” Taking a long swallow from her glass, she ponders. “Why are you doing this anyway?”

“Doing what?” he yells above the noise, leaning in.

“Being nice to me.”

“I can be nice,” he protests, a child imploring for a treat.

She plays with a maraschino cherry. “Not from what I’m told.”

“Yeah, well,” he says, the picture of blasé, “you shouldn’t rely on what people say about me. I’m the one who puts words in their mouths.”

She narrows her eyes. "Where's Elena?"

He takes a swallow from his bottle. "With her brother. Why?"

"Well, there had to be a reason you’re here with me.”

He spreads his hands. “I’m being a good host! And anyway, it’s not like my life consists of one person.” The words are a little too rushed and earnest to be anything other than drunkenly defensive.

Rebekah smirks. “Of course not.”

He sits back then, surveying her. “Guess you’d know about that, huh.”

And a heavy weight settles in her chest. Suddenly the bar seems to shrink around her; the sounds of life and laughter dim, and all she can hear is a shrill ringing.

“Hey,” Damon says then, leaning forward. “Sorry. Not cool. Forget I said that.” He sits up, gesturing to a waitress carrying a tray. Plucks off a tall glass of bubbling green liquid. Pushes it towards Rebekah. “Here ya go, have this.”

She stares at the green cocktail. Suddenly it seems wholly unappetizing. And yet, somehow, still not as unappealing as the alternative. She briskly takes hold of the glass and puts it to her lips.

From across the table, Damon watches her carefully.

//

It’s almost dawn by the time they’re back. The boarding house is huge and empty, so silent that Rebekah is overcome with the urge to laugh loudly, hear her own voice echo off the walls and fill up the space. It makes her smile wide.

Damon shoots her a curious look. “Something funny?”

I must look an idiot, she thinks. (I haven’t looked this happy in decades, she thinks.) “Nothing at all.”

Damon shakes his head, starts heading toward the stairs.

She’s in front of him in a blink. Shoves him bodily against the wall, and pins him there by the shoulders. He has a half-second of surprise, which melts away into smug understanding.

“Damon?” she says, whispers almost.

“Yeah?” he says, voice equally soft.

She fingers his collar. “What shall we do now?”

He lets out a puff of air from between his lips. Grasps the back of her neck. Smiles wryly, and leans in.

She stops him with a finger to his lips. “Tell me why we should do this.”

He blinks, blue eyes glassy and vacant. “Because you want to fuck me.”

She shakes her head, slowly, deliberately, like a governess schooling an insolent pupil. “Try that again.”

He regards her, the corner of his mouth turning up in recognition. “Because I want to fuck you.”

She narrows her eyes. “Say it like you mean it.”

He makes a sound that’s something like a growl, and roughly switches their positions. Trapping her against the wall with his hips, he leans in until their foreheads are touching. “Rebekah?”

She meets his gaze steadily. Bunches her fingers in his collar.

“I want,” he goes on, drawing the syllables out, voice low and just shy of dangerous, “to _fuck you_.”

She smiles mildly. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

And then his mouth is on hers, irate and impatient; their teeth clack rudely together.

It occurs to her that if this were anyone else, it would be graceless and unflattering. But he has reclaimed every unflattering meaning for himself, she thinks. (He must mean every word that he says, she thinks.) The tang of envy rests, sharp and bitter, at the back of her throat.

She curls her starved fingers into his hair and pulls.

  



End file.
